This invention relates to an apparatus and method for aiming a bank shot in a game of billiards, and particularly to a training apparatus and method for teaching the art of making accurate bank shots.
In playing the various games of billiards, including pocket billiards, it is frequently desirable or necessary to execute a shot whereby an object ball or the cue ball is bounced against a cushion along one of the four sides of the billiard table en route to its target, commonly known as a "bank shot." In contrast to other shots which may be aimed by aligning the ball directly with its target, the bank shot is relatively difficult to aim since the ball cannot be so aligned; rather, an intermediate target point on the face of the cushion must be determined which will cause the object ball to rebound toward its target on a proper course, and the ball must be aimed at that point. In addition the bank shot is complicated by the fact that the size of the billiard ball, the relative resilency of the cushion and the force of the shot, i.e. the energy imparted to the ball, all affect the location of the proper intermediate target point on the cushion.
While one can learn to make successful bank shots by utilizing mechanical devices to estimate geometrically the intermediate target point on the cushion, by trial and error or by other similarly complicated or inefficient methods, such approaches are less than completely satisfactory because they consume an inordinate amount of time and their success is limited by the indirectness with which the intermediate target point is determined. It is well known that the process of learning a skill is made more effective by positive reinforcement, that is by attempts culminating in success, and it follows that one could more rapidly learn to make accurate bank shots if the success rate could be increased and the time period required for each attempt could be decreased. Therefore, it can be seen that there is a need for an easy-to-use apparatus and method for aiming bank shots accurately in less time than has heretofore been possible, and with an improved success rate.